This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. The subproject and investigator (PI) may have received primary funding from another NIH source, and thus could be represented in other CRISP entries. The institution listed is for the Center, which is not necessarily the institution for the investigator. The role of this core is to provide support to members of the Virology Center in the areas of measurement and characterization of molecules. The mass spectrometry component concentrates its efforts specifically on the area of proteomics. Proteomics involves using mass spectrometry for the identification of proteins and in determining modifications that are made to these proteins in the biology of the cell. In our laboratory we combine wet chemical processing methods with chromatography, advanced mass spectrometry techniques and computing methods using database mining to identify proteins which may be involved in the various biological processes associated with viruses. These studies were performed using both one dimensional SDS-PAGE and 2-dimensional IEF-SDS-PAGE, followed by in-gel trypsin digestion and separation of tryptic fragments with reverse phase HPLC coupled with electrospray -quadrapole-time-of-flight mass spectrometry. The results from these LC/MS and LC/MS/MS experiments were searched in-house against both proprietary and public domain databases of known proteins.